Krum is brilliant indeed
If you live in the northern hemisphere you think about the light, at this time of the year especially. The light is beginning to change and for those who are particularly light sensitive there is hope that winter will end and spring will come even if it is still cold.
This was an interesting visual representation of our Vitamin D needs done by David McCandless. Again I admit that I am a sucker for these visual displays of information as clever ways to convey important data.
Here’s Jane Brody’s take on it from the New York Times.
Okay, the holidays are over, and many are reeling from the sting of credit card bills, for the orgy that many Americans find themselves involved with, every December. Wisebread, reports, “According to Consumer Reports, shopping with credit cards during the holidays often leads to overspending by an average of 16%. This is part of the reason that the same Consumer Reports survey revealed that 13.6 million Americans were still paying off holiday purchases from 2009 in November of 2010.”
Lifehacker has an amazing info-graphic called “Holiday Misgivings: The Surprising Personal Economics Behind Holiday Gift-giving” that shows the gift valuation gap, the gift card valuation gap, and the gift gender gap. It’s a sobering look at the consuming that has become a part of every day life with little thinking of what all this consuming means for the planet, or how many people are living without work and with more food insecurity than ever before.
If, after digesting this graphic you think you’d like to reform your ways you might go to the library and look to borrow the book The Cheapskate Next Door by Jeff Yeager, a book about living below your means that is full of colorful tales and humor about frugality.
Big Island Canopy, Hawaii
These are the best books I read in 2010 that I have not featured in other postings in the past year:
Fiction
Every Last One by Anna Quindlen
Lovers by Vendela Vida
Mudbound by Hilary Jordan
Red Hook Road by Ayelet Waldman
Under the Unbroken Sky by Shandi Mitchell
Nonfiction
Hospital by the River by Catherine Hamlin
Running the Books: The Adventures of an Accidental Prison Librarian by Avi Steinberg
Voices from the Storm by Lola Vollen and Chris Ying
Zeitoun by Dave Eggers
Time to put the credit cards on ice?
My parents who spoke openly about money matters and drilled into us to think before spending. They stressed how long we had to work to buy whatever it was we desired. We were raised to think of long-term goals and not to get lured into peer pressure. Savings was stressed, as was living within our means, and thinking of those who lived with less. I was an Unicef “Trick or Treater” at a very young age. We were raised to be frugal, to stop and to think before buying, and to know the difference between and need and a want. These habits were well learned and have served me well.
For those who weren’t raised with this “how long did you work to pay for that” math drilled into you, comes Kyle Reiach’s Days to Pay site. Here you can insert your wage and figure out how long you must work, to pay for something, or click on the links and figure out how much charging something, and paying over time will cost. You may well step away from the computer and place your credit cards into the ice tray in the deep freeze.
Last week I sent this Forbes Magazine article, “Is Your Partner Cheating On You Financially? 31% Admit Money Deception” by Jenna Goudreau, around to a few friends, who had not necessarily had this experience, but who I thought should be aware how widespread it was. Most people don’t talk openly about money matters and the topic of financial deceptions.In these tight economic times it’s been harder to hide these things. One is left to think that if 31% admit to money deceptions there must be a subset to aren’t admit it. It is an important topic of conversation to share with your intimates.
The Curious Autodidact 
You must be logged in to post a comment.